School Choice Policy in England: An Adaptation of Sen's Early Work on Capability

An analysis of factors affecting student wellbeing: Emotional intelligence, family and school environment

“…There is a relationship between school environment and student well-being [41], [42]. Parents play a significant role in school choice.…”

The capabilities and human rights of high performance athletes

“…They are the result of choices already made and reflect the present condition of an individual's life, and can be simple things such as being well-nourished, being healthy, having shelter and, for a high performance athlete, achievement in their particular sport. In this latter instance it is the realised physical and mental state of an athlete that allows them to do with as they please, these being the desirable properties of training under their own command (for an educational context, see Kelly, 2010). Capabilities are the available life conditions that enable a possible set of functionings to be available to an individual.…”

Sen and the art of educational maintenance: evidencing a capability, as opposed to an effectiveness, approach to schooling

“…This is why in an effectiveness paradigm increasing school choice is unlikely Cambridge Journal of Education 287 of itself to result in any lasting increase in system-wide attainment if it is not accompanied by a raising of expectation. Too often, the set of various alternative functionings that can be achieved by students through choice is increased yet fails to result in greater well-being, because students, especially those from poorer socioeconomic circumstances, have become reconciled to under-achievement (and their teachers less questioning of it perhaps) or have acquired an inconvenient set of anti-aspirations, and there are only very basic systems of remediation in place to counter that deficit (Kelly, 2010). For example, approximately half of the students interviewed as part of this research reported that greater local choice in schooling per se had done 'little' or 'nothing' for them in terms of changing their view of schooling or raising their life-aspirations, though they agreed that attending a particular school might impact on 'what type of university' they went to eventually, and thus the jobs they could get.…”

“…Opportunity is not simply whether, for example, entrance to an oversubscribed Sixth Form college (16-18 years) is a realisable option for a student, but includes whether (say) the student's family can afford to support the student for another two years beyond the school-leaving age. And simply having the option of going to a good school is not an opportunity if the student cannot benefit from the curriculum on offer there (Kelly, 2010). This is the unrecognised difficulty in the UK with the proliferation of Specialist schools.…”

“…A student with special educational needs may suffer from poor educational outcomes even though he or she attends the same lessons as another student who benefits in all the desirable and predictable ways from the same exposure (Kelly, 2007). So in judging the wellbeing of students in a capability (as opposed to a school effectiveness) paradigm, their 'functionings' -what they actually succeed in doing with their schoolingand not just the desirable properties of the schooling they receive, must be considered (Kelly, 2010). It is not enough to discriminate positively in favour of those from poorly performing secondary schools or disadvantaged backgrounds.…”